


Patterned

by lisabounce



Category: Emelan - Tamora Pierce
Genre: F/F, F/M, Multi
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-06-17
Updated: 2011-06-17
Packaged: 2017-10-20 12:09:58
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,602
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/212637
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lisabounce/pseuds/lisabounce
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>After so long together, some things come naturally and they're pattered after one another these days and maybe always have been.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Patterned

**Author's Note:**

> Many, many thanks to Lauren for fixing it.

When they returned to Emelan, Sandry hugged them all tearfully and left for the palace again, her entourage of rescued women and children in tow. Daja, after due and careful consideration on the long ride home, accepted an offer to work in Sotat for some few months. The city, still scarred by the memory of plague, needed the construction of new copper and lead water fountains, spelled to provide clean water in the town squares. (And singing weather vanes atop the temples, giving glory to the gods when the morning light and sea breezes touched them.) It was good work, and challenging, and Daja took ship some three days after they returned to home. No-one mentioned that she was running from memories of Rizu, when she was only a thought away and refused to go further.

Tris tired easily still, the healing of her injuries delayed by the pressures of doing too much, too soon and her reserves taxed by the strain of the trek south. She took lessons and visited with Glaki one morning a week and only because she could restrict herself to walking only to the wash house and back the following day and bought in bread for the first time. She paid the baker's boy to do her marketing on his way to avoid carrying her goods home. She took walks around Summersea in the forenoon and stretched, slowly and carefully in the afternoon, before her naps. And she retired early each night. 

Briar busied himself with his shakkans and with work in the apothecaries' gardens to the west of the city, tending the herbs grown there and dosing himself for dreams.

He came back to the house (back home) one evening, cut a heel of bread from the loaf on the table in the kitchen and a piece of cheese, eating as he walked through the house. Tris was sprawled across the daybed in the parlour, a blanket tugged across her legs, spectacles neatly folded on the floor to one side. He ate the last mouthful of bread and sat down beside her, rubbing one shoulder. 

"Hey, Coppercurls," Briar murmured, "you've gotta wake up."

"Huh?" 

"Awake. This is no place for sleep. Have you eaten?" Tris just blinked at him, confused and Briar took that as a no. He leaned over and dropped a kiss on her shoulder and stood. "Hold on."

"Mmm."

Briar returned a few minutes later, another heel of bread spread with preserves and a mug of tea in hand. "Here. Eat." 

Tris blinked owlishly and glared but took the food, alternating bites of bread and sips of tea as Briar rifled through his satchel for his own sleep dose, poured a small paper packet of powder into his tea and grimaced as he drank it.

Tris raised an eyebrow at that. "You're still?"

Briar nodded. "The last girl I brought home tried to open my mage's kit while I was asleep. I patched her up and set her outside as soon as it was light. You slept right through it and I'm not bringing anyone else around while I'm asleep."

"I thought you'd just learned how to bediscreet."

Briar smirked and took Tris' mug, carrying them both back to the kitchen, where he rinsed them under the pump. 

"Come on," he murmured, returning to Tris. "You really can't sleep down here. The maid will squark and you'll be angry with her when she comes in in the morning..."

"I suppose you are right," Tris muttered dryly and struggled to her feet with a groan and stumped toward the door. At the stairs, she sighed and groaned at the sight of them. 

Briar moved up behind her and placed a hand at the small of Tris' back. "Do you want to sleep down here?"

"I'll thank you not to take advantage of me, Briar Moss."

"No! But I can't trust any local girl not to try her way with my mage's kit."

"So, what? I'm the next best thing because I can see what's too dangerous to touch?"

Briar sighed and reached out with his magic. _I like someone in the bed with me and it is three flights of stairs. I won't take advantage. I just._  

Tris glared at him. "You'll have to fetch my nightgown. It's folded on the dresser."

"As you wish."

He handed Tris the gown and gestured toward the dressing screen. When she was safely behind it, Briar stripped down to his own smalls though, for the sake of decorum, he left his shirt on.

They'd shared a bed before (on the way to Golden Ridge, on the cots set up in the main room at Discipline when Lark could only be bothered moving so many blankets) but not as adults. 

Briar curled up in the bed, spooned against Tris. She was already limp with exhaustion and he levered himself up on one elbow to drop a kiss onto her cheek. She smiled and slowly, painfully, rolled back toward him, giving him a kiss in return. 

"I could have gone to my own room."

"I know. I just..." Briar curled his arm more tightly around Tris. _Don't make me stay here on my own. Please._

 _I know._ "Goodnight, Briar."

"G'night, Coppercurls."

 

There was a pattern to it after that. Three, five nights out of seven, Tris or Briar made their excuses, or failed to, and they would climb into bed together. Tris' room at the top of the house if she was not too tired, Briar's when she was. A gentle kiss goodnight, two kisses and then sleep.

Tris rolled over one night, sleepy and peaceful, and ran a finger down Briar's cheek, across his lips. He opened his mouth slightly, kissing her finger and smiled, lifting himself up on one elbow to kiss her lightly on the lips and raise his eyebrows at her. "Well, Coppercurls?"

Tris nodded. "I'd like to. I've been too tired of an evening up until now and might be again tomorrow but tonight..." 

Briar nodded. "Are you sure?"

"Will it change anything between us?"

"No..." And Briar kissed her, slowly and carefully, before mouthing the way along the curve of her jaw and down her neck until he reached the ties to Tris' nightgown. He tugged them open even as Tris worked her hands under his own nightshirt.

She sat up abruptly and tugged it off, letting it fall to one side and Briar took that as a signal, removing his own shirt and smalls, before running calloused fingers across her breasts, following them with his tongue while Tris gasped and worked her hands down between his legs.

Briar lost his train of action, bucking in her hold and gasped and Tris did it again. It was a few moments before he could get back to Tris, kissing her neck and stroking one hand slowly and gently across the curve of her belly before he, too, slid a hand between her legs and shortly, he said, "Would you like to?"

Tris sighed as she shook her head. "My hips are still... I think it might not be a good idea." 

Briar nodded and began to kiss his way down her belly, murmuring "That's okay. We can work around that," as he began to move even lower. 

 

Daja returned from Sotat, calmer than she had been since Namorn, aglow with the satisfaction of powerful magic competently performed. 

She raised her eyebrows at Tris and Briar both as they hugged her in greeting and sent a pulse of magic through their bond, only to receive answering ones in return. 

 _It's not changed anything, Daj'_

 _It never would, not between the four of us,_ Tris added. _We're just closer right now, because we need this._  

Daja kissed them both, first Tris and then Briar. "Be happy." It was an order, as much as a blessing and she smiled as she left the room.

 

She was with Sandry, in the woman's workroom deep in her uncle's palace, Sandry working on embroidery, Daja on burnishing a beaten silver pendant in the Sotat style, when Sandry stood, placing the cloth and hoop carefully to one side and moving over to lean across Daja's shoulder in order to see better.

"It's beautiful work."

"Mmm." The smell of Sandry's perfume, the bright and cheerful notes of the golden necklace and silver earrings was heady and Daja turned her head to the side, nuzzling Sandry's neck. 

"I've missed you, too," Sandry said, drawing one hand down Daja's arm.

"Are you sure you want to? I don't want this to be a yes and then no and maybe while you figure things out with me."

Sandry glared slightly, kissed Daja lightly. "It isn't. You were gone too quickly after we got home and I've always been ...flexible."

"Well, then." Daja turned her head and kissed Sandry back, long and slow and careful. "Shall we retire to your rooms?"

Sandry giggled and straightened, linking her arm with Daja's.

Sandry's clothing, her formal satin and silk dress, was bound up with copper clasps, whilst silver braid lined her veil and the buttons to her sleeves were bright brass. Daja ran her fingers across each as she called them loose. and accepted Sandry's help with the ties.

 

It was late winter, almost spring before Tris' hips and pelvis were as healed as they'd get and the last, lingering traces of her injuries faded to aches and crippling pain in damp weather. On another woman, they'd have predicted rain.

She sat on a bench, wrapper folded about her shoulders, in the pocket of kitchen garden Briar had fussed over and babied through a winter that was far milder within the walls of the courtyard than without. He'd (she'd) never have accepted a situation like Crane's glasshouse but a magic-born micro-climate was another thing and she and Briar had similarly protected the apothecarists' gardens.

The wind was here reduced to a breeze, fragrant with the markets, with a hint of salt and shit and fresh baked bread and new tar, blowing in from the east and south. Tris held out a hand, let the breeze run over her fingers, twining through and around them, like an eager kitten. Her eyes widened at the sights. _Daja! Look! The new year's festival in Hajra – they've got dancers on stilts and fireworks._

Daja put down her pliers and rasp, sinking into Tris' magic. The ships in the harbour were bound about with blue and red and yellow lamps, preparing to set sail on the first day past the New Year festival for luck. The earliest Trader vessels set sail then, too, though the land Traders had moved goods and trade all winter long. She drummed her fingers against the cap of her staff, tracing the spiral on the top and took a moment to whisper a prayer. Tris sent a wave of apology and sympathy back through their magic and stood, walking inside. The hand that caught Daja's was calloused, with bitten nails and a smudge of ink on one finger.

“Do you miss your family?” Daja asked softly.

“No. But Glaki... I know it's for the best that she's at Discipline, and I'd have been terrible for her this past year. Lark says she cried for two weeks, even though Little Bear stayed to watch her.” Tris gripped the table with one hand, the arm of a chair with the other and lowered herself, slowly and carefully into the new seat. “Do you know that it took Niko three days to realise she still needed help dressing and toileting when they locked me up in Zakdin? And he just palmed her off onto the housekeeper, while he argued with the council that I wasn't bringing ill omens back into the city. It's all they care about there nowadays. Are you bringing ill luck and more pox?”

Daja nodded. “Traders won't go there. They killed a ship.”

Tris shook her head in disbelief. “I'll make some tea,” she said and stood, painfully. Daja followed her into the kitchen as Tris sent a coil of heat into the kettle and fetched mugs and a powdered tisane Briar had compiled a few days ago, measuring two small spoonfuls into the pot, following it with boiling water. The task done, Daja wrapped her arms around Tris, who buried her face in Daja's shoulder as Daja placed a kiss on the top of her head.

“I'd have been a terrible mother to her this year and, the gods know I tried when I had her, but there was so much to see, all the time and I couldn't stop seeing it, even in closed rooms. I tried but that's hardly everything...”

Daja nodded, rubbing circles on Tris' back.

“I lost her, Daj', and I'll never get her back.”

Daja dropped another kiss to the top of Tris' head. “Maybe we can try again one day.”

 

Things were easy with Sandry and had been ever since three nights before Briar and Rosethorn had left.

Briar would knock on the door to Sandry's workroom deep in the palace and smile before handing over some treat he'd brought – a flower, an orange out of season, a piece of baklava – and Sandry would laugh, eat it or twine it in her hair and tie a string around the latch of the door.

They'd strip, calm and quiet, and lie curled together on the couch in the corner of the room, covered over with a blanket, or make love, slow and gentle across the afternoon.

And then they'd get up, and Sandry would take out her accounts or her tapestry again and set to work, while Briar lay back, a half smile on his face, and watched.

 

It was high summer, a full year gone from Namorn, and Tris sat high on a wagon, her things piled up in boxes behind her. “I'll be back before you know it, Sandry. I just... “

Sandry nodded. “It's Lightsbridge.”

“It's only a year, the certification. The rest of my training, I've already done.”

 _Are you sure?_ She didn't ask. “I'll ride out with you, as far as the white bridge.”

“I don't need your pity, Sandry!”

“No, but you might want my company. It's a full day's travel to the bridge and a lot further to Lightsbridge.”

“Which I'm doing with _Traders_ , who I'm meeting at White Bridge Inn.”

Sandry stuck her tongue out in reply, and nudged her mount.

They shared a bed in the best suite that night and barely slept.

“I'll be back in the middle of Mead.”

“It's Wort, now.”

“I know.”

She watched the caravan until it was out of sight amongst the hills before saddling her horse and riding south.

 

It was Barley Moon before they'd learned each other again and Daja sat quietly with Briar one evening in front of the fire kindled against autumn chill.

“Tris said she wants to try again. Be the mother she couldn't be with Glaki,” Daja remarked.

“She was sixteen and going mad. She did as well as she could.”

“She'd do better now, Briar.”

“If she could.” Never spoken about, that and not even now.

“Sandry can't, not with her Uncle having had another brainstorm. She's Duchess in all but name.”

“Would you?”

“For Tris. And only for Tris. And it'll be called a Kisubo till the day it dies. Any child of ours will be Tsaw-ha through and through.” _Do you hear that, Tris?_

There was laughter and Tris padded her way into the room. “Sandry's on her way, too. She'll be here in a few minutes.

“Good.”


End file.
